A Tale of Two Museums (Redux)

So when we last met I escorted you through the Jacqueline de Ribes Exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum. It was lovely…ish. Maybe I would have been more enthusiastic had I not just come from The Museum at FIT. One of the few museums in the world devoted strictly to fashion, MFIT is a division of the Fashion Institute of Technology, itself a division of the New York State university system (SUNY). It is logical, therefore, that the mission of the museum is to teach, and…mission accomplished each and every time they open a show. Whenever I see their latest offering I can’t wait to see what they’re going to come up with next. Maybe it just wasn’t fair to see anything after going here; MFIT is a tough act to follow.

 

The museum is tucked away in one of the college’s main buildings, and because of the limited space they can’t compete with the grand size of the exhibitions of the more famous costume and fashion shows at museums like Metropolitan or the Victoria and Albert. It is, however, comparable to a Fabergé egg: exquisitely crafted, always the finest of materials used, with a hidden surprise inside.

So let’s start with their current amuse-bouche before going on to the main event, shall we? Yes, it’s hard to believe that a museum this tiny could warrant two entries all its own – and one on a fabric, no less! – but MFIT really does it right. It’s also a great way to demonstrate what makes a fashion exhibit outstanding, rather than a merely a mass of gorgeous clothes.

The textile in question this time is….drumroll…denim!

 

It’s quite possible that you might find something in your closet under a spotlight. In fact, it might be the first thing you see when you walk in.

 

That’s right – the good ol’ 501 button fly. They look kind of different on display in a museum than when they’re all wadded up in a corner of your bedroom, don’t they?

 

The show covers denim from the 1800s until practically tomorrow, and here’s the thing about MFIT: you don’t find the same old/same old there. You’ll get to see historic garments you’ve only seen in textbooks or recreated in movies. These are work pants from the 1840s, and I have to say I find the cut of the waistband very intriguing.

 

 

Here’s the poster and the garment that helped win WWII! Some of us are still rocking Rosie the Riveter’s jumpsuit and bandana today. (Check out my own picture to the right of this essay.)

 

I really have to applaud a curator who’s able to demonstrate the connection between a prison uniform and haute couture by Elsa Schiaparelli, and make a stop in between for the first ready-to-wear denim dress; Claire McCardell’s “Pop Over.” (I love that the pockets look like pot holders; at least they do to me.)

I loved how they peppered the aisles with monitors showing old television commercials, huge mock-ups of past newspaper and magazine ads, and interspersed different designers and eras when it helped to illustrate a point, rather than keep everything in chronological order. 

At one point the television channel was turned to high end designer jeans…you know, I thought back then I never wanted to hear this ad again, and it turns out I was right. No nostalgia for this at all.

 

On the flip side, though, I found myself hypnotized by this iconic ad from the late 70s - early 80s. That was the time it seemed to be played every commercial break, and people of a certain generation (meaning mine) can still sing that jingle. Who was that girl? I really did want to know her better! As far as I know she was never identified and hasn’t stepped forward, although ‘Real Housewife of New York’ Princess (no joke) Carole Radziwell recently claimed to have been the Jordache fit model. (Ummmm…okay. If you say so.)

 

Sure, the jeans were nice, but I’m still waiting for the commercial telling me where I can buy her hair. Spectacular.

Of particular interest to me was how inventive trendsetters and artists used a ubiquitous garment like jeans and made theirs unique, and then how fashion houses took the style back by outright stealing ideas from the trendsetters, then branding it as their own to make a fortune. Witness the following:

 

Ahhhhh….these brought back memories. I spent one entire summer embroidering a pair of my boyfriend’s jeans – and denim is not easy, people – with a Hobbit theme, no less (his favorite book; great foreboding I did not recognize as I was not then nor am I now into Hobbits). What can I say other than I was young and there wasn’t much else to do that summer except listen to Carol King’s Tapestry. We broke up within days of my finishing those jeans. I promise you I am not the only one telling that sad tale.

These jeans …well…these are a different story.

 

Those are Tom Ford jeans from 1999, and I’m betting every former Brownie, Girl Scout and Campfire Girl that walked through that exhibit stopped dead in her tracks when she saw the description card for those beauties. “When they reached stores they cost up to $3,800, which stunned the press.” Are you kidding? The press wasn’t the only one stunned. Maybe I didn’t strain my eyes and prick my fingers all those years ago just for some long lost Arts & Crafts patch; with winter keeping me inside more it may be time to break out the loom and beads and bedazzle the bejesus out of some pair of jeans stuffed at the bottom of our hamper. (I’d leave off the feathers; among many other reasons that’s a dry cleaning nightmare.)

Moving on…

I went with a friend who started frothing at the mouth when she saw the slung-below-the-undies jeans, but I pushed past so I could drool over the circle skirt that was a veritable salute to vegetables, a food group that I love even more when it’s done in applique. 

 

This was part of a 50s grouping, which brought to light the fact The Denim Council was formed in 1955 to turn around an image that was being formed about the fabric; that the main consumers were biker gangs and juvenile delinquents. So much for all those cowboy shows that were on TV at the time; I guess Marlon Brando’s The Wild One and Mamie Van Doren’s juvenile delinquent exploitation films trumped TV’s Gunsmoke. Compare the outfit on the left to this:

Prepare to be corrupted….ladies and gents, Gene Vincent singing Blue Jean Bop!

After The Denim Council was created we got movies like April Love, which starred Pat Boone as the juvenile delinquent. Yes, really.

Be sure to send The Council a thank you note. They must have loved this next hit. (Actually, I do, too.) Eddie Fisher and his Dungaree Doll.

 

Anyhow…

The Museum at FIT manages with every exhibit, no matter how large or small, fanciful or mundane, to make my experience there memorable. This small exhibit on denim made something that could have been pedestrian come alive. Push it to the top of your Must See list.

Next time I’ll give you my impression of MFIT’s Fairytale Fashion, the current show in the Special Exhibitions Gallery.

Here's a hint of my reaction: Fairytales can come true....

Also…

My sincere congratulations to Malan Breton for winning The Fashion Group International's Rising Star award this year for his menswear line Malan Breton Homme. I’m a fan of all of his fashion lines, but his line for men this year made this recognition inevitable. Only Malan was surprised.

Real Housewives of the Garment District

 

Welcome back to those of you who were here last week, and a warm hello to the newbies! Blog Entry #2! Clearly I have a lot of stuff around our apartment that I don’t want to do.

Sadly, this entry also coincides with the week I am breaking up with Project Runway. (At least I hope I am.) Gone is the glory of the Bravo years; I need to skedaddle before they're making good use of an accessory wall courtesy of Pajama Jeans.  I’ve grown weary of manufactured drama and personalities created for auditions. I cannot allow myself to put aside an hour of my time, wait breathlessly to see what comes down the runway, and be rewarded with:

 

Life is too short, that is too fugly, and this would not be a smart(y) use of my time. I loved that show with all my heart, and this is what I get for it: a Valentine’s Day dress to wear to work under a street lamp. 

I had meant this entry to be a one-off about a fashion issue that’s been a thorn in my paw lately, but then I thought – why would anyone who doesn’t know me (and some of the people who think they do) – want to listen to me sound off on this? There are so many fools out there foaming at the mouth on every possible subject – why add to the noise?

With my hand on my heart, I promise never to sound off on topics without having the credentials to back up that opinion. There’s already plenty of hot air floating around out there. An opinion is just an opinion, but I (usually) shut up unless I can add something of  substance. So as for my background in fashion, it’s laid out right here:

I’ve worn clothes since shortly after I was born. 

Not enough for you?

In the early years my outfits were picked out for me, but as I grew older, like most kids, my personal taste began to assert itself, and – while restricted by access to a bank account, the choices a small town can offer, and limitations placed by parents whose tastes were more mainstream than mine (a lot more mainstream) – I began my personal fashion journey.

Time passed, it happened that one of my New York cousins was being bar mitzvahed, and I needed a dress. If you know the Miranda Priestly speech from The Devil Wears Prada about cerulean,* you understand when I say that the Yves Saint Laurent Mondrian influence had finally trickled down to my hometown, and I picked a kid’s version of that trend. (I cannot remember why; heaven knows I did NOT know YSL!)

While in Manhattan we visited the Museum of Modern Art and someone pointed out a Piet Mondrian. (“Look, your dress!”) I stood, I stared, and…something clicked. 

That moment, that painting, that dress – a whole new world opened up for me. From that time, dresses weren’t just pretty; I started gulping down books by and about fashion, fashion designers, art and artists.

Careening forward here like a drunk driver, one day I finally found myself living in New York City, filling out an application for a sales position at Saks Fifth Avenue. My thought was they must need Christmas sales help, and when your college major is essentially tap dancing that’s pretty much what you need to do. I mean why not, right?

Well, I will tell you why not. Saks employees have to look like they shop there. My outfits – including my interview outfit – looked like I marched into thrift shops and sang Hit Me With Your Best Shot (which was not far from the case). My name was called, I sat opposite an elegant woman at a desk and…silence. Finally, “Did those shoes come with that skirt?”

That day’s ensemble was a black turtleneck/long sleeved leotard with black tights (dance class that afternoon!), a black skirt featuring a large chevron rainbow, and wooden platform shoes that had elastic rainbows across the toes to hold them on my feet. It gives me a migraine just thinking about it, but I cannot apologize for all wardrobe choices made in the 70s.

                                          Yes, She Actually Hired Me Anyway

Back to the interview. No, these items weren’t even bought in the same state. The next thing I knew I had a job as a personal shopper at Saks, and – sit down – it came with clothes (and a lot of really great stories with really big movie stars, but you have to come back for those). Eventually I was part of the team that styled the store mannequins and windows, and some time down the line I left for another, less wonderful, job. (Nights when I pound my head against the wall screaming why why why, I have to remind myself how excited I was when Saks raised my salary to $11,500, which was really low in those days, too. Those jobs weren’t held in as high regard as they are now, and I wanted to be able to shop not only at Saks, but at grocery stores.)

Farther down my path I found myself working in the publishing industry; doing publicity for various books. (Again – more great stories! Big, big stars! You need to be here!) One was written by a really great guy named Axel Madsen, and while we went around to various media appointments we discussed his next project; a book he was writing about Coco Chanel. Hello – it’s still not often I get to discuss fashion history with someone who stays awake, so we really enjoyed the rest of his book tour. I happened to know some really obscure stories about Chanel – like Mamie Van Doren obscure (she designed the dresses for Mamie’s ‘Aqua Velva’ commercials!), was even able to cite source material, and am proud to report I made the acknowledgements section of a book on one of my idols (no, not Mamie, although that would have been extremely cool, too).

 

Oh, what the hell:

(I pop up in quite a few books over the years – both in the acknowledgements and in the editorial content – but that’s in blogs yet to come. So now you’ll either really want to subscribe or be really over me in a big way.) 

I worked hard, rose in the ranks, worked with major celebrities (yes, you guessed it, more great stories!), and eventually opened my own boutique PR firm. ('Boutique' - that's French for 'try and find me.') I wanted something…something…else though (by this time I really loathed big celebrities), so I decided to get a Masters degree so I could really explore my greatest passion: Information. Knowledge is, after all, power!

So much to everyone’s surprise – no one's more than mine – I was now doing research for international banking firms, which meant that I now could afford (well, almost) the fashion I had been wishing for all those years. After all that yearning, though, I found I was happier throwing my own ‘finds’ together rather than buying someone else’s predetermined looks. (I only wish I had also ‘found’ the secret to credit cards – there’s interest accruing! – at the same time.)

So years passed, my fashion style began to get more focused, I accumulated more pieces in my closet, accrued more interest (%) and interests, but life happened and fashion (and the rest of the world) had to chug along without me for a bit. (Some of those stories are only great in retrospect.) One night Project Runway popped up on my TV and renewed my love of sewing and design (and backbiting), and I got the push I needed to get back into the swim. 

Fun aside: One night, just when I was rejoining the world, my husband (yeah, there's a Mr. Smarty Pants) and I were at the theater, and as I was walking down a staircase – very Norma Desmond – I noticed a man who looked really familiar smiling up at me. I’m really bad at matching names to faces so I had to mentally scramble but by the time I hit the bottom step I realized who that smiling face was – Malan Breton, a former contestant on Project Runway, now one of the top luxury clothing designers in the world. I mean…maybe that was him. I really am bad at faces, so that guy could also have been someone I spilled something on at some long forgotten social disaster. I decided to circle around and see if this could possibly…well, the cut and the fabric of his suit was calling card enough for me, and sure enough Smiling Guy was Malan Breton, who – after I summoned up the nerve to introduce myself – told me he had smiled at me “because (I was) so chic.” 

Well. 

My husband tells me that after that I was walking into walls and traffic, but all I remember is a bunch of foolish stutters, staring at his business card, and the thought that remains with me to this day: This makes up for all those times my mother screamed at me, “You’re not leaving the house dressed like that!”

Fast forward to today, when I’m sewing at Mood Fabrics (I made that coat – even the leather parts!), meeting designers I rooted for on Project Runway, and just generally having more adventures.

 

Despite my personal cheering section, I don’t have any dreams of going on the show (I am way too old and waaaaaay too pokey), and I don’t harbor any dreams of starting my own design firm (way too broke and way too lazy). I just love the creative process, love having an idea and then - Poof! - the clothes, and most of all I love having a better understanding of what I’ve been reading about all these years: how a designer garment (as opposed to ready-to-wear) is constructed. (Couture being a highly overused word.) What makes a Chanel jacket a jacket by the House of Chanel, as opposed to a Chanel-style jacket? How close can I get to making a fairly decent one? And if I can make jokes about the clothes designers are producing…can I come up with better?

In addition to all this, I live in one of the fashion capitals of the world, and you better believe I take advantage of it in any way I possibly can. I see every fashion-related exhibition, documentary, lecture, and runway show I possibly can.   

I take classes, workshops, seminars, webinars – you name it. I’ve purchased an actual Project Runway garment so I could turn it inside out to see what actually happens when you’ve got the blink of an eye to design and construct something to send down a runway before a panel of industry heavyweights (or whomever the producers foist on viewers that week) as judges on an international television show.  I still read and collect all the books (even paper dolls!), rip pages out of the magazines with hopes of either purchasing, adapting for my closet, or railing about what a rip-off that particular garment/collection is (a topic for another day).  

Fashion is my passion, or at least one of them. I’m so incredibly lucky to be living in New York City, where so much of it either originates or comes to visit, and in the age of the internet, where I can dig out what I can’t get to personally. I’d love to share that luck with you.

“Life is a banquet, and most poor bastards are starving to death,” taught Mame Dennis. 

Grab a plate, and meet me at the dessert cart.

 

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